


Morpheus

by Prar



Category: Rockman Zero | Mega Man Zero, Rockman | Mega Man - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Romantic Fluff, but he's super in the bg, but still romantic, innocent cohabition, napping together, post mmz2 so not too romantic, rocinolle is there too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:27:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23146195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prar/pseuds/Prar
Summary: CielZero fluff, post MMZ2. Lord knows we need more of it."Three times. That’s how many chances Zero gives her, and she burns through them over the next weeks, all soft words and apologies and excuses. As before, they both know how important the energy source is, only this time, she’s unaware he can clearly analyze and understand the full extent of her lifestyle choices - accommodate them into his own amortization - and that her time is up."Someone's sleep debt is about to be paid.
Relationships: Ciel/Zero (Rockman)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 36





	Morpheus

This part, he remembers quite clearly. It was common enough knowledge, after all. 

Back at Hunter’s base, 150 years and 2000 kilometers away, navigators almost always ran without stopping. Depending on the emergency setting, they would sit with the hunters during gossip hours, or file reports, or sit plugged into specialized support hardware at all times - integrated with the AI of the very base they served in order to optimize military output, half themselves and half protocols. A job encoded into their directives and molded into their hardware, harmonious with their base programming; they were always available to it and took pride in executing it correctly.

Just as back then, the Resistance also has two core operators holding onto the communications and research, armed with an array of tools that allows them to oversee all operations as necessary at any time of the day. They help optimize his missions. They help with custom transportation. They hack, bicker, research, work in tandem in 16 hour shifts and their names are Rouge and Jaune and  _ not  _ Ciel.

Which leaves him standing at her door at approximately 600 hours, bewildered at the sight of her, visor on, at her computer, still working on a segment of her research.

He’s watching her tap away roughly 4 thousand lines an hour, and as his optics zoom in on the layered display that presumably floats around her eyes in multiple dimensions, he does some internal math with when he saw her last in the same position and-

“Did you take a break from that today?”

She jolts, fingers mispressing in a highlighted error, and turns to him at the way he mentions  _ break _ , but with that posture shift he already knows she didn’t.

And that’s fine, he thinks carefully as she stutters - an apology, an explanation, and an affirmation, her body sliding off the chair to rush to catch up with light knows what she’s missed out on on her schedule. She is built to cope better than a regular human in dire situations. Her research is pivotal to the future of the human and reploid race alike. Having ceded her duties as a navigator, she took to engineering, and now she’s reaching her breakthroughs. More of her work means less of  _ his  _ work, and they both know that.

But also, she is a human, and although he knows she’s capable of much, doing this kind of work 8 hours past established civilian curfew leave his long term simulations with some questions. 

He disarms them, returns a detailed report to the assigned space, and leaves her be. He might, after all, just be paranoid. It’s just one instance, hardly an appropriate sample for any kind of study.

But when he sees Rocinolle two days later to ask for some studies over human biology and eugenics, she already knows, and she’s  _ livid _ .

It’s not readily apparent, since she was made for the softer end of interaction scales, all smiles and soothing gestures. But the nurse is practically wobbling with indignation and her words become biting - biting right at him.

“And you just let her  _ be _ ? That’s - that’s the 4th time she’s done this, she always ends up lapsing into that- Oh, of  _ course  _ you don’t know-” Zero twitches, because despite the lingering gaps in his data and initial lack of variables to his combat prowess, he’s not  _ disabled  _ but she’s already ranting off and pushing back her sleeve to quick port.

It’s nothing compared to the Neo Arcadian cloud, accessible at will and oh so reminiscent of those past aeons when the entire world was connected by wireless data infrastructure. But it’s enough for Zero see Rocinolle’s point, and as she releases their wrists from the connection cables, she gives him a deadpan look.

“If you catch her next time.” She sighs, a notification from Jaune popping up on her monitor already, demanding her attention. “I authorize you to use force to make her sleep.”

* * *

Three times. That’s how many chances Zero gives her, and she burns through them over the next weeks, all soft words and apologies and excuses. As before, they both know how important the energy source is, only this time, she’s unaware he can clearly analyze and understand the full extent of her lifestyle choices - accommodate them into his own amortization - and that her time is up.

“I’ll wrap this up in 15 minutes.” She says to him one night, massaging at her strained wrist carefully. She’s arching slightly from one side to another, trying to find a less tired side, and he puts his report down, closes the door behind him, and leans his back against it.

“10 minutes.” He counters, and she gawks. He means it though - his internal clock activates a separate string of 600 seconds exactly, and he gives her a meaningful stare.

Ciel looks like she’s about to question him, but then just throws her visor back on and begins typing away as fast as she can, squeaking that  _ this is really just 15 minutes _ and  _ she’s just about done with this branch _ and  _ she’s going to take a longer break afterwards she just wanted Cerveau to have a look at this one element- _

The ten minutes run out, and she practically screams in horror as he pulls his back away from the door- stalks up to her- she’s pressing send buttons frantically and freezing in terror for the three seconds it takes her software to confirm all saves as his arm clamps down around her midsection. They both press the power button at once, and then watch the system flicker off for a well deserved rest. Ciel is sweating bullets. Zero is unimpressed.

“S…” She attempts, swallowing through the stress because oh god, oh god. Don’t rush a programmer. “See? It’s all done. I’m going now. I’ll sleep and… And…” His arm is still around her stomach. “Let me go…?”

“No.”

“Right, right- wait, what…?” That’s when he half-lifts, half-walks her towards the bed, turning the lights off as he goes. “Oh, come on- Zero!”

She’s not resisting particularly hard though, and that just about confirms that she knows he knows and she’s guilty. “I’m just… I know it’s bad. Rocinolle and Cerveau get really mad with me over being neglectful, but…”

That’s when he collapses with her on the bed. She squeaks, frazzled and indignant, and he pins her with his arms before she can wiggle out from underneath him.

“Wh- Ah- Zero! Let me- Oomph!”

The trick is, he’s a robot. Animated metal. There are numerous weight distribution and support systems installed into his body, but there is no rule forbidding the tonne of him from just freezing up. Which he does. On top of her. Inhumanly still, he stares at her disapprovingly as she slowly gets the message between each attempt to break free from her bunk. Finally, she slumps, and looks him in the eye - where she  _ thinks  _ are his eyes - in the dark.

“Can I at least have some breathing room?”

He says nothing, but the easy steel cuffs of his fingers on her wrist give way and she draws her knees up to take off her heels. Then she screws the back cap of her helmet off and pulls it apart carefully- then she starts working on the crop jacket and this, this is silly. The more she has to accommodate herself, the more embarrassed she feels. A reploid can go into recharge mode under almost any circumstances without all of the coddling, but after all, she’s no reploid. 

She’s done and overworked herself and she’s so tired and anxious, yet her routine-bound body is determined to keep her awake until she drops. The back of her head feels woozy. Zero’s clicking and shuffling around and if she was truly coherent she’d inquire about what he’s doing, but she’s not and he’s literally keeping watch on her over-organized, unorganized self so she might as well spare him more trouble.

They settle back together, vestless, and she thinks that maybe, just maybe, the delicate sweep of his hair creeping around her shoulder means that he’s removed his helmet.

The bunk bed is busy with him arranged on top of it, but it’s very warm. Zero always has that air of security that makes it easy to breathe deep about him. And, if you remove the anxiety of being such a colossal inconvenience, Ciel can relax faster than she’d like to admit. His core doesn’t pulse like her human heart; it gives off a sound at an even frequency, sometimes shifting into slightly different gears, the sound dropping slowly as he readies himself in for a guarded nap. Compared to it, her chest is drumming, but even it evens out as the easiness seeps into her bones.

She was saying no sleep until she drops? Well, barely a few minutes into this and she was losing her touch. Sleeping for less than 20 hours overall in a week seemed like a horrifying ordeal for a normal human being, but she thought she’ll deal with it alright with her enhanced physiology.

And she was wrong. It worked - at first. But by the end of it, she was just distracting herself from the dragging exhaustion and pain. Compared to it, laying like this next to something solid and warm, it was just… it was really nice...

* * *

She ends up completely flush against him, creeping close and then looking for an unarmored spot to settle her face in. Zero angles his neck without opening his eyes, and she ends up settling into his collarbone, tip of her nose smushed against the softer silicone skin there. 

Cute, no consciousness attached. The back of her brain has decided that he was an optimal heat source. He is - he’d intended to be. Now she’s all close and he can wrap his arm around her shoulders to potentially guard her exposed head with no weak point.

His internal clock tallies her up as he fades in and out of guarded recharge mode. She slips through the dream phases, sometimes relaxing, sometimes on her guard. He doesn’t disrupt her, doll-like, though she does give off a pained whine at one point - a noise that has him snap back into reality with one hand already on his empty sword holster, strands of hair physically rising into the air in search for information and right, right. He can’t protect her from her mind, can he?

He shifts around, optic sensors scanning along her figure. He readjusts her a little bit - hopes the physical shakeup will give her some edge - and drifts off again, despite his readings.

This goes on for some ten hours. Well, more, but there is a break as Ciel shifts, yawns, and opens her eyes to blearly reorient herself from the tail end of REM 3. 

Her heart gives an almost verbally startled pang when she notices where he is and remembers the societal distance between them. Then the events of yesterday come back - he can practically hear her thoughts through the vibrations and changes in her body language; how she slowly rationalizes his presence in her immediate surroundings and stamps the rush of adrenaline in her systems.

Eventually, she very carefully creeps out of his loosened embrace - extra careful and lingering, trying to wager whether to speak up to him or not. Finally, she just gives up and dives into her utility quarters.

When she sees him again, he’s sitting still on the bed, a curtain of hair creeping over the bedsheets and one leg over the edge. To her credit, she anticipates him. He’s not sure about the slow in her step as she takes in his shape - perhaps she’s just trying to gauge him back. But then she creeps forward, and carefully collects herself on the bunk next to him.

She’s all wispy hair floating down about her frame and neat short dress over the adaptive fullbody; rubbing her feet together awkwardly as the silence stretches out between them. He fixed his armor when she was gone. Her face is hot - he wonders if she’s overheated, so he asks her if she’s rested well.

“Oh, um.” She looks down at the dress. “Well, I think I got all wrinkled up, but that’s to be expected.” A pause, and she rubs at her eyes. “I feel a little dizzy. But I’m not sure If it’s because I slept too much or too little.” He makes a single affirmative noise, watching her decide what to do next. “I… Actually, I think I’ll go get another nap.” She giggles awkwardly, leaning away until she flops on the far side of the bunk. “I’ll try to not make anyone worry anymore, so you don’t need to look after me so much.”

He watches her curl up on her colder side, her back to him, and gives another affirmative grunt before settling down into a half-sit and resuming his internal clock.

The total time she spends out of it tallies up to the teens. From past curfew until morning and then midday, their little chat in the dark has truly occured around 900 hours daytime. When she finally seems ready to go on and start her day, Ciel is astonished to find everything outside of her soundproofed rooms in its usual afternoon hustle. 

Zero is still in the same position, one foot deep in the Base’s navigation network, quietly processing the day’s updates as she comes back from the doors, practically gawking.

“How long did I…?”

“Fifteen hours and forty six minutes” He says, and she looks like she’s about to protest, before just slinking into her computer chair with a depressed whine.

“You had a debilitating sleep debt. It’s odd you weren’t in a coma for a full day.”

“A full day…” She wheezes just at the thought of it. “No. Impossible. This kind of a break in my schedule-” It trails off into a small self-derogatory rant as she taps on a power source, slowly bringing her room out of sleep-mode. Hopping up to snatch her outfit together, she shyly dismisses him before running to get a late start on her day.

* * *

In the evening, he’s back, and she drops her research when she sees him. 

They have a standoff- she’s looking at him like he’s going to reboot her computer when she’s not looking- but he just stays at the door to carefully detach one forearm guard and one leg guard, gently slipping his metallic foot out of the brace. By that time she realizes what he’s up to - specifies her objections - and shortly afterwards comes to realize she still doesn’t have a say in the matter.

And the day after that. And the day after that as well. He’s planned out a whole two weeks for her brain to recuperate from whatever bodily strain she’d decided to inflict on herself in an effort to self-flagellate, and he’s pretty obviously going to see it through. For a time, she tries to beg him off due to ending up in too many clothes to be comfortable.

He points out that she doesn’t need to wear anything but her suit.

She ends up ‘in just her suit’. It becomes almost impossible to talk to her afterwards, though, and her nervous fidgeting increases substantially.

* * *

He gets woken up once at 350 by a threat level above 60%; Jaune’s voice a careful whisper in his consciousness as she sends him over the strategic threat forecasts.

They’re a tangle. Tugging his arm free from the sleepy grip of Ciel’s fingers, Zero debates internally, before leaving her without a disturbance. Fixing his bulletproof and clicking into his terrain soles, Zero taps the comm and exits into the darkened hallway.

5 hours later, he’s back, gunshot chip in his helmet and in need of a thorough washing. Letting the energy systems go down a few pegs, he gets surrounded by attentive hands and lets the post-mission proceed.

When he sees her again it looks like she’s tired - but his readings don’t really agree with each other, and he attributes it to a belated mission update more than anything else. She doesn’t comment. Sipping on some morning coffee, Ciel just watches from the Operator balcony, listening to a set of situational and logistical updates.

* * *

Despite much dilly-dallying and employment of all sorts of social formalities, they end up cohabiting quite well. Zero has heard that humans are antsy, but beyond those first few hurdles his presence was approved into distances she would classify as confidential. He, apparently, makes for an amazing back-warmer, with his defensible hold repurposed as a heavy blanket. 

It’s never explicitly said, of course. But humans are as open as a book when their guard is down and- he has over a hundred hours of recorded experience. At this rate, he should have a rank promotion in sleeping together.

Her schedule is back to normal, and soon he’ll be leaving for his proper quarters. 

It’s a miracle they’ve had as little interference from Neo Arcadian forces as is.

He’s staring at her, curled into his side carefully after some careful asking. Her sleep stages are all sorted out now, brain processing all data properly. There’s an increase in her mood and productivity, and Rocinolle has personally thanked him with a monthly ration of Crystallized Energen that he just barely dodged out of accepting.

He’s sure she’ll adapt well from this point on, with a schedule set in place firmly and her sleeping debt paid off. And he can be replaced with Alouette, Ciel’s literal security blanket, quite easily. So, from now on, he can pat himself on the back for a job well-done, and go back to looking after himself more as well.

Before he does that, though; he tucks her head under his chin and waits for her to wake up. Through the dizzy, slow, human equivalent of boot up, the normally alert and always on top of her game Resistance leader reduces her already miniscule threat levels - looking around dazedly, wiping at her eyes and wiggling blood into her limbs with a puff of annoyance. Secluded between his armored arms - it’s amusing to observe her, and to coexist with her, a combat android of his caliber with a human being curled up right on top of it.

* * *

He’s landed himself in the infirmary in critical condition again.

He can practically smell it - the burn of rapid status checks and self-regeneration attempting to give him back an entire leg from the hip down. It can’t, and it’s reeling him with the painless disturbing tang of failing his primary directives. Survive. 

Just survive. You’re online.

Whatever sensors he’s got left implore at the void around him at the top of their capacity, receiving a dim and vague appropriation of the Resistance’s engineering wing. Base. Base status- he’s sifting through his logs rapidly until he sees the image of an enhanced custom golem. Type E. Times two. Of  _ course _ .

His damage feed webs together intimately with a timeframe of dedicated swings directed at his enemy. Golem down. Terrain collapse. Stabbed. Shocked.

Second Golem down. Base uncompromised. Mission Complete.

He finds his leg on a nearby stretcher, surrounded by smaller elements and cables. Completely dislocated, but not lost. A part of his proximity sensors was penetrated, the wires cut or otherwise yanked out, leaving irritating little gaps in his back coverage. His energy tank was depleted through the energy stored in his tank disagreeing nuclearly with the voltage entering his systems from the outside. That’s most likely what knocked him offline between Rouge’s rapid transportation feedback and Jaune’s damage control.

He takes a deep breath, forces himself to reprioritize from belated combat to energy saving, and then notices his hand is being held.

He can’t see, but he knows it’s her. She’s curled up just beyond the fan of his hair, staring down at him. He gives her a garbled, synthesized grunt, and she reaches out her other hand to stroke up his hair and helmet.

“I sealed you up.” She murmurs next to his receiver, and he grunts again. “Cerveau will fix your leg while you’re recharging, so you can just rest for now. I’m right here.”

It’s probably ironic to a degree, but he ends up being too tired to care. He just twitches his hand back against her fingers, all previous claims forgotten, and lets her lull him into unconsciousness.


End file.
